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ARTSBEAT; No Small Roles: 'The Hobbit' Announces Its First Cast Members

By DAVE ITZKOFF

Published: October 23, 2010

Wherever his ''Hobbit'' movies get made, Peter Jackson wants you to know he has a cast to appear in them.

News surrounding Mr. Jackson's planned two-film adaptation of that J. R. R. Tolkien fantasy novel has lately focused on a labor dispute between the filmmaker and actors' unions in New Zealand and Australia, and whether he will move the film out of his native New Zealand as a result. But Mr. Jackson and the Hollywood studios behind the ''Hobbit'' features threw eager audiences a bone on Thursday by disclosing some of the key actors in the movies.

In a statement published by The Hollywood Reporter, Mr. Jackson and executives at Warner Brothers, New Line Cinema and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer said that the title character of Bilbo Baggins will be played by Martin Freeman, an actor from the British television version of ''The Office'' and the film ''Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.''

Mr. Jackson said in the statement that Mr. Freeman ''is intelligent, funny, surprising and brave -- exactly like Bilbo and I feel incredibly proud to be able to announce that he is our Hobbit.''

Additional cast members include Richard Armitage as the dwarf Thorin Oakenshield; Aidan Turner and Rob Kazinsky as the dwarves Kili and Fili; and Graham McTavish, John Callen, Stephen Hunter, Mark Hadlow and Peter Hambleton as additional members of the dwarf company.

Other key roles were not immediately announced, including the wizard Gandalf, a character portrayed in Mr. Jackson's ''Lord of the Rings'' movies by Ian McKellen.

Mr. Jackson and the studios reaffirmed in their statement that the ''Hobbit'' films would be released in December 2012 and December 2013.

This is a more complete version of the story than the one that appeared in print.